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Connecticut Victim Advocate Investigating 2010 Triple-Murder

EAST HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) _ A state victim advocate is investigating the actions of East Hartford police before a triple killing in 2010, saying officers knew one of the victims had feared for her safety.

Beverly Therrien, 72, and her live-in caregivers, 60-year-old Pamela Johns and 53-year-old Michael Ramsey, were found beaten to death in Therrien’s home on Thanksgiving Day. No one has been charged in the killings, but police named Therrien’s son and daughter _ Brett and Candace Bednarz _ as “persons of interest” in the case.

“A cursory review of judicial records, documents and other information establish that the East Hartford Police Department had numerous interactions with Beverly Therrien … and that they were advised on several occasions of Ms. Therrien’s concern for her safety,” State Victim Advocate Michelle Cruz said in a statement Tuesday.

Cruz said she wants to determine if town police acted properly in their dealings with Therrien and whether they did enough to protect her.

Deputy Police Chief Beau Thurnauer told The Hartford Courant that he couldn’t comment on Cruz’s investigation.
“I don’t have enough factual information in front of me to respond with accuracy,” he said.

Police records show that Therrien was involved in many disputes with her grown children in the years before her death, the Courant reported. Officers charged Brett Bednarz in a case of domestic violence against Therrien in March 2010, and he was sentenced to probation.

At Bednarz’s sentencing, Therrien said her son had assaulted her at least seven previous times but that she did not call police. She also said she did not want her son to go to jail.

A judge ordered Bednarz to have no contact with his mother, one month before the killings.